Nearly twenty years have passed since the 1992 Earth Summit, yet development in North and South remains
dangerously unsustainable. Extreme poverty, climate change, deforestation, loss of biodiversity and rising
resource use, among other ills, demonstrate the lack of political leadership and inefficient implementation of
international agreements on sustainable development. Finnish NGOs1 demand a change: social and
environmental development goals need to be understood as being more important than economic goals.
Thus, we recommend the following to be included in the conference declaration.

1. Assessing remaining gaps

Despite the promises made, the social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development
are not in balance. In order to find a coherent and balanced way to combine the dimensions of sustainable
development and to support the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, Rio+20 needs to adopt
a rights based approach to sustainable development.
For instance, conventions on biological diversity and climate change have not been properly implemented,
and stagnation of multilateral cooperation prevails. Therefore, it is crucial to agree on the timetable and
concrete measures to accelerate implementation of international agreements on sustainable development.
Governments must also agree to elaborate national and local action plans that substantially improve
governance of sustainable development objectives.

Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Climate change increases vulnerability and poverty, and makes challenges related to natural resources, food
security and water shortages even more urgent. Eventually, it threatens our very existence. As the first step,
developed countries need to acknowledge promptly their responsibility of the climate crisis, to take concrete
actions towards emissions reductions, and to commit urgently to providing the required support for climate
action in developing countries. In Rio+20, governments must raise their ambition regarding increased
emissions reduction targets and financial commitments, equitable effort sharing, and robust implementation.
Recommendations
? Assess 20 years of progress since the Earth Summit in 1992, take stock of existing greenhouse gas
reduction commitments and adaptation efforts, and raise the ambition in the light of the current
climate science that shows that more emission cuts are needed than previously estimated.
? Respect the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR).
? Ensure the flow of substantial, predictable and sufficient climate finance beyond 2012. Climate
finance must be additional to the commitments to raise development aid to 0.7 percent of GDP by
2015.

Ambition regarding biodiversity protection should be raised and concrete measures taken to make sure that
the commitments made under the framework of CBD will be achieved. Governments should promptly
acknowledge their responsibility for and capability to deal with the crisis of biodiversity, and urgently commit
to providing the required support for biodiversity protection in developing countries. The wave of mass
extinction should be stopped by 2020.

Recommendations

? Recommit to obligations agreed to in the Strategic Plan for biodiversity 2011?2020, including the
Aichi Biodiversity Targets agreed at the 10th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on
Biological Diversity in Nagoya, Japan, in October 2010. Sign and ratify Nagoya Protocol on Access
and Benefit-sharing.
? Raise ambition regarding the targets of the Convention on Biological Diversity and their realization
by respecting the principles of common but differentiated responsibilities and the precautionary
principle.
? Recommit to respecting the rights of Indigenous Peoples as proclaimed in the UN Declaration on the
Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

2. Sectoral priorities

All human beings and nations should be guaranteed equitable access to and equitable distribution of energy,
food and clean water. Also sustainable forest and marine resources management and support for sexual and
reproductive health and rights play an important role in a move towards a more sustainable development.
Human rights should be taken as the basis for sustainable development.

Energy

About 1.4 billion people globally live without access to electricity and 2.5 billion people cook on open wood,
dung or charcoal fires. Energy access and development go hand in hand: it is highly unlikely that any of the
MDGs will be achieved without access to modern energy services. Many developing countries have an
abundance of Renewable energy sources and have huge scope for improving energy efficiency. In short, they
can be supported in leapfrogging fossil fuel-based economies towards low-carbon sustainable energy.
Global energy consumption must decrease heavily. Developed countries must acknowledge their ecological
debt and stop adding to it. Decarbonizing the economy by 2050 will require a transformation to a lessconsuming
lifestyle, a reduction in energy use, the neutralization of carbon emissions from fossil fuels and a
shift to renewable sources of energy that do not add to the atmospheric accumulation of carbon dioxide.
Providing rural areas with decentralized grid systems powered by energy from solar, biomass or small scale
hydro might not attract private investments. Nevertheless, such projects must be core business of a
partnership aiming at energy access for all. Hence, while supporting joint public-private investments to a
certain degree and for certain countries, this financial model will have to be supplemented with a grant-based
system.

Recommendations

? Commit to removing barriers to Renewable energy and energy efficiency investments, including
subsidies to fossil fuels.
? Rio should deliver the urgent phase-out of counter-productive subsidies, for example fossil fuel
producer subsidies or subsidies to unsustainable fishing or agricultural practice.
? As 2012 is the UN year of access to sustainable energy, agreeing new energy goals to expand the
energy access of the poorest, shift to renewables, and increase in energy efficiency must be a
priority for Rio+20.
? The target should be set by the United Nations of, by 2030, everybody having universal access to clean, reliable, effective and affordable energy services for cooking and heating, lighting,
communications and productive uses.
? Commit to a ?leapfrog fund? to finance access to sustainable energy initiatives.

[UNDESA/DSD: Please download the original document to read the full submission]